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UFPPC (www.ufppc.org) Digging Deeper XLI @ Mandolin Café (Tacoma, WA) February25, 2008, 7:00 p.m.
William McDonough and Michael Braungart,
Cradle to Cradle: Remaking theWay We Make Things
(North Point Press, 2002).
Introduction: This Book Is Not a Tree.
Products in the home can be dangerous (3-5)..
Cradle to Cradle
is made from arecyclable synthetic paper made of “plasticresins and inorganic filler” (5-6). Theenvironmental message is no fun (6-7).McDonough grew tired of trying to be “lessbad” as an architect (7-10). Braungart was ahumanistic chemist working withGreenpeace (10-13). Their initial meeting in1991 led to collaboration:
The Hannover Principles
, design guidelines for the 2000World’s Fair, founding of McDonoughBraungart Design Chemistry (13-15). “Wesee a world of abundance, not limits. . . . weoffer a different vision. What if humansdesigned products and systems thatcelebrate an abundance of human creativity,culture, and productivity?” (15-16).
Ch. 1: A Question of Design.
 
Titanic
is anapt metaphor for our industrial infrastructure(17). The Industrial Revolution (18-24). Itwas grounded in a vision of nature we nolonger have (24-26). The industrial systemand countermovements, too, were markedby a “cradle-to-grave,” brute-force model(27-35). GDP as a perverse criterion of progress (36-37). We are producingunhealthy “crude products” (37-42). Needfor change (42-44).
Ch. 2: Why Being “Less Bad” Is NoGood.
The history of the effort to mitigatethe Industrial Revolution’s effects: Godwin,Malthus, the Romantics, conservation,Rachel Carson, Paul Ehrlich, the Club of Rome, Fritz Schumacher, Robert Lilienfeld &William Rathje, Maurice Strong―leading tothe concept of “eco-efficiency,” or “doingmore with less,” which has been embracedby many corporations (45-53). But eco-efficiency only makes things
less bad 
(53-67).
Ch. 3: Eco-Effectiveness.
Three designsfor the book (68-72). Comparing design of acherry tree to a building (72-77). “The key isnot to make human industries and systemssmaller, as efficiency advocates propound,but to design them to get bigger and betterin a way that replenishes, restores, andnourishes the rest of the world” (78). Weshould attempt to design positive sideeffects (78-82). Example: the roof (82-83).Our “culture of control” can be an obstacle(84-86). We should learn to “become native”(86-89). Call for a new design framework(86-91).
Ch. 4: Waste Equals Food.
Proposesdesigning a metabolism of technicalnutrients, like those in biology, instead of using “monstrous hybrid” materials,achieving a “cradle-to-cradle” cycle (92-103).“If humans are truly going to prosper, we willhave to learn to imitate nature’s highlyeffective cradle-to-cradle system of nutrientflow and metabolism, in which the veryconcept of waste does not exist.
Toeliminate the concept of waste means todesign things―products, packaging, and systems―from the very beginning on theunderstanding that waste does not exist 
”(103-04; emphasis in original). Example:design of a factory producing compostableupholstery fabric (105-09). “A
technicalnutrient 
is a material or product that isdesigned to go back into the technical cycle”(109). Instead of owning a product, we couldown purchasing rights for a
defined user  period 
of 
 products of service
(111; 111-15).Some materials will be
unmarketables
andneed to be stored safely (115-17).
Ch. 5: Respect Diversity.
Diversity isnatural principle to be respected (118-22).All sustainability is local, beginning withmaterials (123-25). Sewage treatment canbe based on bioremediation instead of chemical treatment (125-27). Design shouldconnect to natural energy flows (128-32). This can suggest solutions for transitionalsystems, e.g. using solar and wind (132-39).Packaging materials could be reconceived solittering with them is desirable (139-41).One-size-fits-all should be abandoned (141-44). Use “feedforward” (144-46). Use aneconomy-equity-ecology triad to investigatemanufacturing processes and produced an“industrial re-evolution”(147-56).
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